


If only you knew the rain

by Cesare_Blanc



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-20
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-07-25 17:36:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7541743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cesare_Blanc/pseuds/Cesare_Blanc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>[Season 5 finale spoilers!]</p><p>--But then she unfurls her hand and she's kissing Chloe again and the thunder matters not, and the wind is just the wind, and the rain frames them perfectly, and she is kissing those lips and they are squishy and salty because they are before the sea, and it's all Max desired and even more. This is how it was supposed to happen. This is it.--</p><p>On a desperate attempt to find closure, Max rewinds one last time just before sacrificing Chloe. And when that one last time doesn't do the trick, she starts to understand that even by the second last time, or by the third last time it's not getting any easier...</p>
            </blockquote>





	If only you knew the rain

 

If only you knew the rain

 

 

 

 

    _Seven long years I served for thee,_
    _The glassy hill I clamb for thee,_
    _Thy bloody clothes I wrang for thee;_
    _And wilt thou not waken and turn to me?_
    
     Joseph Jacobs, _The black bull of Norroway_

 

    
    
     _"_ You know what, fuck that. _"_
    
     Cesare Blanc (just before the final choice in _Life is Strange_ )

 

 

    
    
    It wasn't supposed to end like this. It was never supposed to end like this. Rain thundering down on her skin like prickling needles, Max turned her head towards the wonderful human being she has spent the last five days saving from her past, saving from herself.
    
    "It's just the right thing to do," Chloe said, and Max hoped for the wind to wash those words away; she hoped for her ears to be filled with tornado howling, she hoped to be knocked out cold by a piece of wood, by a flying tree, anything. Better to come back to the labyrinth, chased by phantoms, than to withstand Chloe's balled fists, the curve of her lips, her blue eyes, and to think she was seeing her for the very last time.
    
    It wasn't the right thing to do. The right thing to do would be to come back between her arms, to tilt her head upright and kiss those wonderful lips once again, once more, one more time, again and again and again, beyond all fear and all the pain. That was the right thing to do. Or maybe run for shelter, not this bullshit farewell, exposed like sitting ducks on top of a hill. Rage bubbled up from the pit of Max's stomach, growing hotter with each broken breath: the wind and rain curtained Chloe's form, drawing her edges in black and white with each thunder, like flashes, like the universe was getting one last shot of her broken life. Max felt her fingers curl, and she stopped just before she crumpled up the photo.
    
    The wind picked up and started growling; behind them, the tornado grew darker as debris and planks and what remained of walls and cars and... other things, screaming things, but it must have been the wind, no way their screams could be heard so far away. Chloe turned and curled her fists in anguish.
    
    "It's hitting the town! Do it _now_!"
    
     Max extended a hand towards Chloe. Poor, poor Chloe, who couldn't get one clear shot in her life, let alone by her father, let down by Max herself, betrayed by Rachel. And yet, she only knew half all the horrors she went through. Max wasn't as lucky.
    
    "Max! Please!"
    
    Chloe extended her own hand towards Max, And Max, with one final smile, nodded. It took just a moment for her fingers to close down and maybe, just maybe, it had been enough for Chloe to understand what she was about to do. The universe blurred, the wind running backwards, sounding like a wail of all the people she was betraying with a gesture of her hand. How many of them would experience their death once again, being ripped and torn limb from limb?
    
    But then she unfurls her hand and she's kissing Chloe again and the thunder matters not, and the wind is just the wind, and the rain frames them perfectly, and she is kissing those lips and they are squishy and salty because they are before the sea, and it's all Max desired and even more. This is how it was supposed to happen. This is it. This time, Max is ravenous. She almost bites Chloe's lips, she takes her neck in her hands, and she starts to breath from her nose, which Chloe doesn't.
    
    And in fact, when Chloe broke their embrace a moment – or a year? or two? - later, she was panting, and a sheen of lust appeared on her cheeks. She passed a hand to move her hair away from her eyes and her smile sent small red sparkles all around Max's heart.
    
    "You know, if I knew you were so good a kisser, I would have done this a lot more," she commented. Then she turned towards the tornado. "It's coming, Max. Do it. Don't you ever forget about-"
    
    She stopped, maybe because of the grin Max's been sporting. She felt that grin bit into her cheeks, she felt the weight upon her shoulders, her guilt piling up just as rewind after rewind the vortex turned into the tornado. Maybe it was enough for Chloe to understand. But she does understand already, doesn't she? Max would never forget about her. Never.
    
    She used her power once again. One last time, for sure. Just once. This time, the wail of wind was less like an accusation and more a part of herself she has grown accustomed to, like an old wound she's not proud of, but she had to accept.
    
    And then Chloe is once again on her, and she hugs her and grans a bubbly laughter as she kisses those lips once again. There's less urgency this time, she knows she can savour them, she writes all the little crevices in Chloe's lips, the way her hearts beat one in the each other's echo, and how their blood seems to pump from two two of them, from their conjoined hands, from the way Max whispers some sweet nothings into Chloe's ear, and then she's comes back to kissing her again. She doesn't even remember what she told her. Maybe that she's her best friend, and she's kissing her best friend and it feels as if she found God, as if God had always been down the road, waiting for her to acknowledge Her presence, and not by prayer, just by doing this, and this must be God because it's so right, it feels so right, like everything is back into its due place and this must be what hope must taste, hope an-
    
    It's over.
    
    Chloe withdrew from her once again, and she panted, in exhaustion this time.
       
"Wowser, girl! That's some way to say farewell! If I knew you were such good a kisser, I-"
    
    "Would have done this a lot more". In a moment, Chloe's eyes flashed with worry, then comprehension. She opened her mouth to say some other silly thing, once again, like she _needed_ to die, she _needed_ to die for this universe that played her through and through, and Max had after all seen all the bad tricks in the universe's black sleeve. "Me too," Max said, just before turning back once again. Wind howling in her ears again, starting to become a recognized pattern. Just this once. Just this once, then she'll let her go. She asked Max to let her go, after all: she _learned_ something, took a page from Max's own book, at last.
    
    Max learned something too. She learned how to kiss Chloe so well to make her moan, and she exploits that knowledge right now, biting the bottom lip, then licking just a little the top one, and she feels Chloe's confusion and surprise at seeing her so brave and so bold, and she has to restrain herself, after all, this is for Chloe's is her first time, while Max had already kissed her four times (plus one, but it wasn't like this never like this), this is the best yet, the best, the best... she cups her neck and brings her closer, she writes _I love you_ on Chloe's lips with each shuddered whisper, she shivers as Chloe mutters _too_ before kissing Max again, and she grips on her shoulder because this is how things should have gone, this how their stories should have unfurled and she did everything through hell and back to bring Chloe just here, just for this moment.
    
     It's always too brief.
    
    "Wowser, girl! That's some way to say farewell! If I knew-"
    
    "If only _I_ knew," Max muttered, as she traced her lips with her fingers. "If only I knew what I would end up doing for you". She took a step towards Chloe, cupping her left cheek with her hand. Chloe does that too, and it felt warmer than a summer's day on Max's damp skin. Drops, or maybe tears obscured her vision for a moment.
    
    Chloe chuckled, her voice bubbling up to the surface as if from unseen depths, then turned her head towards the tornado.
    
    "It's time, you know?"
    
    "Better than you," max answered, and the curled her hand once again.
    
    Just this once, _just this once_ , and then she will let her go. The entirety of Arcadia Bay was asking her to let her go. Kate, in her hospital bed, curled beneath sheet, as she spit verse after verse, her drawings unrecognizable under the downpour that must have seeped through the window, left alone by all of them just like she had always been. Joyce, and Warren, and Frank, inside what was left of the Two Wales Diner; Joyce would never hug her daughter again. David neither. Warren would never go to the drive-in. Frank's life would have been swept away by fate on the swift wings of storm. Maybe Victoria was safe. It didn't matter that much. Whatever Max could do, she did. She railroaded a train, for Chloe. She stole and cheated, for Chloe. She entered the dark room, for Chloe.
    
    She's kissing Chloe once again, yet this time... this time she's gentle. She enjoys all the little shivers, the little breaths, the way Chloe tastes – a blend of sweet and sour, and tobacco and maybe a tinge she doesn't recognize, is that weed, and all that is just Chloe, so much _Chloe_ that her mind reels – the way her body is still warm beneath the coat of rain, and then Chloe smiles, and the deal is settled. She went through hell and back to protect that smile, and she can't have it just then, she can't have it just in this moment, and Chloe doesn't really _want_ to die, does she? No, steadfast, good-hearted Chloe couldn't make this decision. It's Max. It's generous, meek, selfless Max who has to let go. It's not like this never happened. There's precedents. Orpheus and Eurydice, for one. Names Chloe would forget, but that to Max represent that what she's about to do is right. When she opens her eyes, she fixes them on Chloe.
    
     "You know, if I knew you were so good a kisser, I would have done this a lot more," Chloe says, once again. Max grins and it's like grinding glass, and doesn't let her go. Once already she made that mistake. She sacrificed Chloe to other people. They mattered, they were kind and nice and precious to her, but what is a torch when Max is looking straight into twin blue suns, so bright, ever so bright, so bright that everything else just goes blind? What does it matter? She's not making the same mistake.
    
    "I'm sorry you didn't," Max says. She did everything for this. And as the universe grew angry and vindictive over her mulishness, Max kept on going back, kept on trying to fix things up. Fix Chloe up. So the universe decided she had to die. So the universe decided Chloe Price had to be erased. Fuck this. Fuck the universe.
    
    "It's time, Max," Chloe says, turning her head towards the tornado. Max doesn't follow her gesture: her eyes stay fixed on her. Never letting you go. Never again. She went through hell, like Orpheus, and unlike Orpheus, she was not going to let her beloved go.
    
    "But you will," Max says, following her last phrase, and she rewinds once again. This time the wind howls in her ears like a last warning, like one last cry out to let her go, to save herself. Too late. She walked that road ever since she walked in to scare Nathan, and she has only added more steps. Always more steps. No sense in stopping now, now that's she's so close. As for her damnation, what she went through in her dream state just a few minutes ago must account for something. It, for one, was enough to make her agree with the other Chloe. She truly is selfish. Turned out Chloe really was a bad influence on her. Sorry Joyce...
    
    And then she's not kissing her again, she has took a step behind, she came further back. Her head is dizzy, maybe because she used her power so much, maybe because of other reasons.
    
    It matters not. She's still holding the photo in her hand. Not for the first time, she notices how the butterfly's blue is the very same shade of Chloe's eyes. But sure it's for the last. She doesn't even hear the paper being ripped, she only hear Chloe's disheartened cry, and then Chloe's shaking her, and shouting:
    
    "Why! Why did you do that!"
    
    "I-" Max says, hugging Chloe to stop her, and the girl stops, "I already made my choice. I told you. I already killed you. Can't stand to betray my partner once again."
    
    "But... the town."
    
    "You are my town."
    
    "I..."
    
    And then Max stops her, and she puts her lips on Chloe's and all is wonderful and right once again in the world, and Chloe curls up like a broken leaf, bawling and shaking and hitting her on her back and to max it matters not and Chloe is bawling her mother's name and Max comforts her and she already feels the weight on her shoulders, the huge weight she will feel with each day, with each hour from now on, but that she will forever be glad to bear.
    
    As far as she's concerned, she holds all that matters in her arms.

 

**Author's Note:**

> And as far as *I'm* concerned, bae comes before bay. I finished playing Life is Strange a couple days ago, I loved it through and through even in its less strong moments, and some of its strongest has left a strong impression on me. Some of those impressions were good, cherished, and they will be a source of merriment for many years to come. Others, I couldn't stand. I finished the game saving Chloe, the first time, and I felt pretty good with the ending, unlike some – many – other people who would have wished for a more 'realistic' one. I actually liked the detail of animals coming back both as a way to account the renewed establishment of natural order and as a subtle nod to the phantom doe we witnessed. A bit short, but I enjoyed it.
> 
> And then, out of curiosity, I went back and played the other ending. In fact, I did the single thing the game warned me against (ignore the consequences of choices, spamming rewind out of idle curiosity) and damn if it punished me for that. The other ending was heart-wrenching in its unraveling of everything I did as Max during the twenty hours, and counting, of excited gameplay, and it also provided what, in my opinion, was a rushed ending in which Jefferson and Nathan were thrown in jail, and all the people I saved from the other universe survived in this one. It was awful.
> 
> This, together with a brief walk to get some air and clear my head, prompted me to write this short piece; I also have to admit that my decision to sail the Max/Chloe ship had a great deal of importance to my disappointment. I have read a few analysis around the Internet which point out (rightfully so) that, if the game is played choosing a friend-only interaction between Max and Chloe, and it's thus seen as Max having to choose between leaving her childhood (Chloe) behind or jump into adulthood, the bay over bae ending makes perfect sense, simply because you don't have a bae, you have a friend whom you had the chance to say one last goodbye. And that's good. I actually find it a pretty elegant explanation (well more like an interpretation).
> 
> Point is, the game and Max herself reminds you time and time again of how important Chloe is, and it feels somehow lacking (at least to me) to not explore their relationship to the end. And this is where things get sour, because in this case, you are not leaving a piece of your past behind, you are erasing a part of your future. And this makes Max's choice cruel, much more cruel than it was supposed to be.
> 
> Also, unlike other people who enjoyed Life is Strange as a narrative over responsibility and adulthood, I like to think of it as an 'empathy simulator' of sort. What's most shaking, in my opinion, and the true strength of the game, is that in the end it puts you before a choice we have all made once, twice, who knows how many times: many important, yet budding and incomplete relationships versus a single one. I choose to play the game on the most empathic route I could do, often choosing to rewind if only to give people a chance at a better understanding, and as I came upon that final choice, it just felt wrong to let the person I had done that much for die. Those old lines from The black bull of Norroway, which I love (it's an old Scottish fairy-tale about a woman trying to rescue her lover), sparkled the fire, and the rest was a cathartic writing session. Other parallels, with Puella Magi Madoka Magica's Homura, Shadow of the Colossus's Wander, and The Girl Who Leapt Through Time's Makoto come to mind, but I won't address them now, or this author's note will turn into an author's essay. I should probably start a blog.
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks for reading. Comments are hella welcome.


End file.
